I was so overpowered by this unexpected news that for a moment I could not speak.
“There was a fortnight yet,” I stammered at last.
“That is true, but a convict warder has privileges, and sees his friends oftener than once in three months. You look so white and sad, I wonder if you would care to come for a drive with me? Yes, and we will take your dog, and go up past the racecourse along the Nundy Droog Road, where you will get plenty of air, and scarcely meet a soul.”
“I should like it immensely,” I said, springing up, “and I’ll fetch my hat.”
As I left the room, I nearly collided with Mrs. de Castro, who was bearing in with her own hands a tray of cakes and coffee. There was no avoiding this refreshment, and I could see that she was extremely proud of entertaining the wife of the jail superintendent in her own house.
I enjoyed that drive more than anything for a very long time. The fresh air and the swift motion revived me. How different from rumbling along in a gharry with my landlady, who preferred excursions into the bazaar, or down St. John’s Hill, and had no taste whatever for the open country! We passed cheery parties of riders coming from the racecourse; among them I recognised a man I had seen at Silliram, and hastily turned away my face. Mrs. Hodson was not a steady talker like Mrs. Soames, or my former self, but she opened her mind to me and took me into her confidence.
“In one way you and I are both in the same boat,” she said. “You shrink from society because of your brother’s trouble—society shrinks from me because I, an Englishwoman, and well born, have married a Eurasian or Anglo-Indian, as they are now called. I have never, never regretted the step, excepting that it cuts me off from women of my own class. They will talk to me, and even come to my house, and admire my garden, but between us all the time a great gulf is fixed. I was a governess out here; my health broke down, and I was almost penniless when Richard Hodson came to my rescue—or rather his sister did. Ultimately we were married, and in my way I am happy. If I had one or two real women friends I’d have nothing left to wish for. At first the jail and the convicts depressed me. The ‘chink, chink, chink’ of the irons moving to and fro about the garden got on my nerves, but now I do not seem to hear them! To-morrow you must come and see my garden. I wanted so much to have your brother to work in it; it’s healthier and more interesting than making gunny bags, but when my husband spoke to him he said that nothing would induce him to show himself out of doors.”
The next afternoon Mrs. Hodson’s pretty victoria arrived to carry me to the jail. My heart was thumping hard as we drove along, and when I got out and was received by the superintendent I was trembling so much that I could scarcely walk. However, I managed to crawl to the room where prisoners received their friends and there I found Ronnie awaiting me.
At first he bore up wonderfully, but for my part I was so overcome that I could only weep and murmur, “Ronnie! Ronnie!” At last he too broke down. The spectacle of a man crying is inexpressibly tragic. I thrust my own miseries aside and did my utmost to console him. I felt something like a nurse comforting a child that has hurt itself. “What was the use of anything?” he murmured, why look forward? He was branded for life; wherever he went the horror would follow; no nice girl would ever marry him! After a time, when we were more collected, he said in his old peremptory style:
“Now you know, Eva, it’s all wrong your being out here. I won’t allow you to sacrifice yourself for me. You really must and shall go home.”